Big Data and the Human Touch

Over at Wired, James Cattermole from Hexigo writes that, as companies come to rely more heavily on data, they risk applying data-driven solutions without any regard for common sense and the human experience.

In order to execute a big data strategy, companies need to focus on the human decision making elements just as much as the technology. Businesses as well as scientific communities know that the best decisions come from cross-discipline or cross-department collaboration. This is insurance against groupthink and burning cash on data projects that have no potential value. The quality of decision-making needs to be as high quality as the data itself.